Design + Creativity + Adventure = LOVE

Woohoo, it’s Friday, my favorite day of the week! And to celebrate I thought it’d be fun to share a few of my current favorite things…

1) Stroller Strides | Ryan and I first started going to this mom & baby workout back in January and my only regret is we didn’t start sooner! It’s been so fun meeting other mamas and babies all while getting a great workout outdoors. They have them all over the U.S. so if you’ve got a little one and are struggling to fit in time to workout (I most definitely was!) check them out.

2) Being Boss podcast | If you’re a fellow creative entrepreneur or creative business owner, you need to check out the Being Boss podcast. Not only are Kathleen & Emily kicking-ass in their respective fields but their no-nonsense with a touch of woo-woo approach to business is refreshing.

3) Sunny spring days | Even though the winters here in Texas are fairly mild, I’m so excited for spring to finally be here! The trees are blooming and everything is turning green. Now to take advantage of it before it gets freakishly hot again!

4) The return of the Texas bluebonnets | If you’ve never seen a field of bluebonnets, you are missing out. I totally thought it was just a weird Texas thing when I first moved here but after our first bluebonnet season, I totally got it. Not only are these flowers gorgeous and unique but the fact that they’re only around for a short period of time makes them that much more special. I love keeping an eye out for them popping up around town and if you want to get hardcore about it, there’s even websites that post bluebonnet sightings. It’s hardcore y’all.

5) Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt | I started watching this original Netflix series on a whim and by episode one I was hooked. In a few days I’d binged watched the entire first season (isn’t binge watching the best?) and I can’t wait for season two. This show totally fills that quirk meets charm void left behind when 30 Rock went off the air. Thank you Tina Fey.

And that’s a peek at five of my current faves! What’s one of your faves right now? Let me know in the comments below.

And…if you’re looking for a fun & easy way to kickstart your creative and get more of your story into your digital scrapbooking albums, join me in The 2015 Monthly Faves Project, a year-long scrapbooking project designed to celebrate your top ten favorite things every month.

For just $29 for the year, you’ll receive 12 exclusive digital scrapbooking templates, a monthly email with tips from yours truly and a private Facebook group where you can connect and share your work.

The weekend before my birthday and our Southwest road trip, Adam and I ended up to Austin for one of my favorite events of the year: the Renegade Craft Fair.

If you too are wondering how you can get your husband to accompany you on crafty adventures like this, I have just one word for you.

Bribery.

Our afternoon started with a quick stop at mmmpanadas. We had tried to hit up this food truck once before and missed them so it’s safe to say given all the hype we’d heard about this one, our expectations were high. I mean, if you’re going to plaster you’re one of the “10 Best Food Trucks” right on your truck, you better have the food chops to back it up.

See, bribery totally works. Look how happy he looks!

So how were the mmmpanadas you say?

Well as much as I hate to say it, our mmmpanadas were less mmmazing and more mmmk. Maybe we caught them on an off day, I don’t know, but Adam and I both agreed they were kind of like glorified Hot Pockets – complete with the lack of flavor and the I’ve-been-microwaved-a-wee-bit-too-long-crust. We just thought they’d be a bit punchier flavor wise than they were. The pineapple cinnamon dessert one I chose was by far the best of the three flavors we tried, but even so, I’m not sure this is a food truck we’d specifically seek out again.

But we weren’t about to let our less than stellar food truck experience deter us – there was crafty amazingness to be had!

If you’ve never been to a Renegade Craft Fair, it’s basically like shopping etsy in person. Which is awesome, except if you choose not to buy something, the person who made said items is usually standing right there. Can we say awkward?

No but seriously, the fair was full of amazing artists from all over the country showing off their awesome handmade goodies including etsy staples like this…

Which I have to admit is actually pretty cute. (I didn’t get the name of the artist on this – if everyone knows, let me know!)

I was specifically looking to find some jewelry this time around (my jewelry collection is sadly lacking) and this fun felted teal and yellow necklace from PrettyKiku was one of the first that caught my eye.

These reclaimed wood vases by BDJ Craft Works have been on my mind since I saw them at the spring Renegade Craft Fair last year. The square succulent planter especially caught my eye since we all know I’ve become a little obsessed with succulents lately.

These typographic neighborhood prints from Ork Posters were right up my alley but sadly they didn’t have any for places we’ve actually lived. Where’s the San Antonio love, huh?

These whimsically nerdy prints by anna todaro were one of my favorites of the day. There’s just something about Yoda or Spock surrounded by girly flowers that is hilariously awesome.

Seriously, Abe Lincoln in a flowery top hat? I can’t handle it. Adam and I were really tempted to bring one of these guys home with us but we weren’t sure where we’d put it. Although I totally think it’d be awesome to have one mixed into a gallery full of more normal photos.

These shirts from The Social Dept. were so fun. But I’m pretty sure I mostly took this photo to prove to Adam there were in fact other men at this event.

I especially liked this shirt on the right:

These home items from Cloth and Ink were right up my alley. I loved the mix of colors and patterns.

This notebook from makemynotebook totally made me laugh. I love the idea of a notebook specifically for scheming.

I’m always on the lookout for cute cards I can use as art and I really liked these ones from Satchel & Sage.

These guys from hello wars may just be the most adorable things I’ve ever seen in my life. The Chewbacca one with a bow was totally calling my name but I’m not sure I could handle that amount of cuteness on a daily basis.

This jewelry from Favor Jewelry were some of my favorites. They were the perfect mix of simple yet sophisticated.

If you’re wondering about our process for tackling the craft fair, this is what we do:

We always make two passes – one for browsing and one for buying. The first pass we pick up business cards from any of the booths we like. This way we remember which ones we liked and we have links to their stores if we end up wanting to buy from them in the future. Adam also marked down on the map the booths we for sure wanted to go back to purchase from.

Then once we’ve finished the first pass, we usually take a little break and talk about which items we actually want to purchase (and which fit into our budget). While it might not seem like a lot of fun, I highly recommend setting a general budget of how much you want to spend before you go – with so much awesome stuff, it’d be easy to go a bit crazy!

Once we’ve figured out what we want to purchase we go back to those booths and pick up our stuff. So what did we buy this time?

First up, we bought this card and print from Satchel & Sage to use as artwork for our bedroom:

I also picked out this necklace from Favor Jewelry. A huge shout out to the girl working the booth – she was SO patient with me as I tried on pretty much every necklace they had. They were all so pretty I couldn’t decide!

Afterward we headed to one of our favorite food trucks, Coolhaus, for some delicious homemade ice cream sandwiches.

I’m telling ya, food bribery? It works.

If you’ve never been to Austin before, the food truck scene is basically like this. There are food truck areas scattered around town where groups of trucks gather. Some of them travel around but a lot of them tend to be in the same spot all the time. Which is great because it makes it both easy to find them and you almost always have lots of options in one place.

We love Coolhaus because for $5 you get to choose your very own combo of fresh baked cookie and homemade ice cream.

I went with the chocolate chip cookie and root beer ice cream. And yes, that wrapper is edible – it’s made out of some kind of potato paper I think so you don’t have to worry about eating around it.

Adam went with a chocolate cookie with the Guinness Chip ice cream. I’m not sure what Adam is doing in this photo but I like to think he’s pondering the magic that is the Coolhaus ice cream sandwich. Or praying to the sandwich gods for making it so deliciously amazing. You choose.

Here’s me with my sandwich. What this photo doesn’t show you is these babies were melting like a polar ice caps on the sun – and it wasn’t even that hot by Texas standards!

So despite the fact that we look all nice and calm eating our sandwiches, the reality looked a bit more like this…

…as we quickly scarfed them down before they turned into big melty messes.

And yes I’m going to leave you with this gem of a shot because well, it’s awesome.

Anyone else ever been to a Renegade Craft Fair? Are food trucks a thing where you live? We have some here in San Antonio now but I don’t think it’s quite at the level of Austin just yet.

If you received the Nettio Designs newsletter over the weekend or saw my Sweet Shoppe Saturday blog post this week, you may have seen a little comment about this week being my “eek, I’m officially turning the big 3-0!” birthday week! Well, I’m turning 30 on Thursday, May 24th to be exact. Which means I still have a few days left before I’m officially a tech-lovin’ gal in her thirties. Eek, scary! I admit, I’m not totally sure how I feel about it just yet, haha, but hey, the show must go on, right?

So in celebration, I thought it was only fitting to spend a day or two saying goodbye to my twenties and what better way to remember birthday year 29 than with a Faves list?

After all, I’ve been creating them for half of my twenties already considering my 25 Faves at 25 was my very first Faves list ever…

And I did one for my 28 Faves at 28 list last year too…

So I figured a new 29 Faves at 29 would be a nice way to capture this last year of my twenties, so without further ado, I give you my 29 Faves at 29 layout:

Anyone else ever done an age-inspired layout to celebrate a birthday? I have to say I love looking back at these layouts because it’s so fun to see what changes (so many of the 28 ones are Colorado specific!) and what stays the same (fresh fruit and veggies – woohoo for healthy eating!).

Well, it’s official. We’re one quarter of the way done with 2012. Only nine short months before the end of world, folks, are you ready?

I’ll be back later this week with an update on my 2012 Scrapbooking Resolutions but in the meantime, I thought it would be fun to share a few of my favorite layouts I’ve done so far this year.

To be fair, it wasn’t really that hard to decide considering I’ve only digital scrapbooked a whopping 15 pages so far this year which I know, I know, most of you do that many layouts in your sleep. But hey, it’s been a busy year so far! And surprisingly that number actually puts me two layouts ahead of where I was at this time last year. That my friends, is progress.

To kick things off I’m starting with the first layout I did this year, my One Little Word layout for 2012.

One Little Word 2012

I never really think to do photo-free layouts but every time I do them, I end up loving them. I especially love how the talk bubble cutouts came out on this one – I just want to reach out and touch them.

2012 Goals

I’m pretty sure I could do clean, blocked designs like this for the rest of my scrapbooking life and be perfectly happy. I just love the clean lines and all the little homes for the elements. Plus this kit is pretty much a combination of my favorite colors in the whole world which is why my outfit ended up perfectly matching despite being completely unplanned.

October 2011 Faves

Aww, repeating shapes, how I love thee. The shapes on this page were actually inspired by a design I saw on Pinterest – I love that they’re geometric but still a little wonky. And of course, a Chicago layout (with photos of the Bean, no less) is always a good time because it means I got to hang out with my sis who’s a grad student there.

Life is an Adventure

I can’t remember where the inspiration for this layout came from but this was one of those pages that just flowed. Like you come up with the idea and wham, what feels like seconds later, you’ve got an awesome layout you love. That doesn’t happen to me all that often so when it does I’m always amazed. But I love how bold and colorful it is and the cutout title of my life motto is one of my fave trends of the moment.

You & Me

This layout is actually a redesign of another older less-loved layout of mine (more on that another day) but I LOVE how it turned out this time. Zoe’s kits always rock my socks and this one was no exception. I would so wallpaper my house in those yellow chevrons if I could. Plus the elements in this kit were to die for – it was so fun to just layer and play.

Happy Great Spring Clean-a-thon Day 5 everyone! Today’s post is perhaps a bit too specific for the Clean-a-thon being that it’s both Mac-specific and highly based on my own personal experience, but because one of my goals for this week was to organize my photos in Aperture, this seemed like a good time to write this much overdue post about why I decided to make the switch from Adobe Lightroom to Apple Aperture.

A few things to note before we get started:

1) Aperture is designed by Apple which means it’s Mac only. My apologies in advance to any of you PC users since this post will probably not be quite as useful for you as I would like.

2) My experience is based off Lightroom 2 and Aperture 3. But other than lens correction, I haven’t seen any features in Lightroom 3 or 4 that have made me regret my decision.

3) I am not a professional photographer. I have no desire to be a professional photographer. So if you are one or hope to be one, your needs are likely different than mine. This is just my opinion based off my needs as a tech-lovin’ digital scrapbooker.

Ok, so with that in mind, here we go…

Why I Decided To Switch To Aperture

Last summer, I decided it was high time I get my photos in order. At the time I was planning to start Project Life as one of my 29th birthday goals and I knew in order to keep up with it, I would need an easy way to manage my photos. Up to that point I had been using Lightroom for organizing and editing all of my photos in tandem with Photoshop and while I liked it, there was something about it that never felt quite right to me.

Yes, I understood how it worked. Yes, I could organize and edit my photos and get good results. But I didn’t enjoy using it.

For one, I found the module design to be overly clunky. While I’m sure it’s fantastic when you’re editing 100s of photos from a shoot in a linear fashion, I never do and so even with shortcut keys, I found it annoying to switch between modules all the time. I especially found the separation between folders, collections, smart collections and tags made it difficult to organize everything easily in a way that made sense to me.

So when Apple announced they were lowering the price of Aperture to less than what it would cost me to upgrade to Lightroom 3, I decided to download the 30-day trial and give it a shot.

And I have to tell you, I was sold from day 1.

I LOVED the simplicity of the interface. In fact, it was almost one of those, that’s really all I need to do? kind of moments. It seemed overly easy compared to Lightroom.

I could organize, tag and edit my photos all in the same window. It was quick and easy to switch from a slideshow to a folder to a smart collection and I could group them all together in one spot.

I was getting better edits out of my photos with less work and the colors in the photos popped in a way I could never get them to do in Lightroom.

Even though it’s not an Adobe product, I was still able to easily open my photos in Adobe Photoshop for more editing.

I love the integration it has with my Mac. Auto-downloading of iPhone photos? Yes please.

It all just felt so much less complicated and better suited to my needs as a scrapbooker.

No, Aperture is not perfect. I find it runs slower than Lightroom 2 on my almost 4 year-old MacBookPro (although I suspect the same would be true for LR 3 & 4. Poor compy is just getting to that age.). I find the import options, especially when it comes to renaming files and not importing duplicates, to be more robust in Lightroom. And I think having built-in lens correction for lens distortion, etc., would be really handy to have.

But ultimately, I’m willing to deal those issues in exchange for the overall experience of using Aperture. Because I enjoy using it in a way I never enjoyed using Lightroom. Much like how I felt when I originally switched from a PC to a Mac.

Which ultimately is what I think this debate boils down to. In much the same way as the never-ending Mac vs PC debate, it ultimately comes down to personal preference. Both Lightroom and Aperture are amazing programs. They’ll get you where you need to go.

But which one works best with the way your brain works? For me, that’s Aperture.

Anyway, I realize this is a highly untechnical review of a largely technical program, but I realized when I sat down to write about why I switched, it wasn’t because of any tech specs or specific features. It was the overall experience and flow of the program that sold me.

So if you’re a Mac user, check it out or download the trial and give it a try! If you like it great, if not, Lightroom is a pretty awesome program too. And if you’re an iPhoto user, Aperture is kind of like iPhoto advanced but you can read more about the differences here.

Well I hoped you enjoyed this little insight into why I made the switch from Lightroom to Aperture! As always, if you have any questions, feel free to ask them in the comments.